The Higher Secondary Certificate (HSC) and equivalent examinations for 2025 begin this Thursday at 10 AM with the Bangla First Paper. A total of 1,251,000 students are registered to take part in the exams, which will continue until August 10. Practical exams will follow. This year, more than 1.05 million candidates are from nine general education boards, over 86,000 from the Alim (Islamic) board, and more than 109,000 from the Technical board. The number of candidates has dropped by 81,882 compared to last year. All coaching centers will remain closed until August 15, according to the Ministry of Education.